The super savvy savers continue steering their way through September

[northender]

Thought I'd start a shiny new thread as we've filled the other one so quickly.

Audit I don't think you meant me, I haven't got kids.

Cat needs £45 of bladder tablets and his vaccinations. Ho Hum.

lilac I haven't done any of the fancy cooking yet. Let me know how it goes. Good luck!

Had a shock this morning. Was sorting the washing out and found a jumper I swore I sold on eBay two weeks ago. had a massive panic only to find out I hadn't even listed it. But going to wash it, dry it and list it tonight as I'm sure it'll get me £10! (It no longer fits DS)

Im an absolute plonker

Apparently it's sunny all day so the washing is on!

I had a think and realised why we are not saving money.

In the past we had this house as a shared house with four adults all earning. At that point we were saving well.

Then we bought the house, had ds almost immediately and I gave up my job. The other two adults moved out and bought houses too.

That means dh is paying for all of the house expenses and me and ds from his one (now larger) salary instead of sharing the costs between four earning adults.

That explains a lot!

I know you'd think I'd have figured that out, but ds was born right after we bought the house and he didn't sleep for four years so I'm just starting to get myself together and take stock a bit.

So really the problem I'm having with saving is the expense of running a house on one salary (council tax and so on), and it's not all just our eating habits. Phew!

Collie I love the jumper thing. Hope it sells.

Havent read back through very far as for some reason MN wont load on my phone, on the laptop quickly now for a few mins doing other things.

Hugs to those that need them.

Bit spendy yesterday but I am pleased that each £ is working a bit harder ;)

DS needed new shoes, £40 in clarks, but I had £39 in vouchers so they cost £1 :D if only theyd had a sale I could have got 2 pairs but he really needed them now.

£42 in boots on their first xmas presents (new PJs), and a load of clothes from the mini-club sale bit (love the quality) for future - things like girls leggings for £1 etc. Also got 500 points back on their spend £35 get 500 points promotion so I was pleased.

Then we went back to mums for tea, and my lovely uncle landed up with another huge back of hand me downs for DD (he has been passing on all her cousins stuff, which there is a lot of and most still with tags on as they buy a LOT) so we were grateful for that. Must sort out all her 9-12 month stuff as her 6-9 is getting tight!

Today I will be trying lidl for a full shop, will report back later. had a sainsburys order in the basket, mid check out last night it went 'your slot has expired' and took away all the slots, at 11pm! so now I have to actually go so I figure sainsburys dont deserve my money lol and time to try out lidl for a proper shop :D hopefully save some money.

That eat well for less was madness, £259 for a weekly shop - £17k a year in groceries?! I'm sorry but £200 a week is still far far too much for that small family. Grr.

I'm kind of glad to hear that that family on eat well for less were spending more then me. We work out at about £800 a month, so we are well ahead of them, and but still guilt-stricken every time Collie talks about her budget. I reckon that being on funny diets for food intolerance is just very expensive.

I have a friend who has a postal subscription to have 2kg blocks of interesting cheese sent to his house 4 times a year though. That's a whole different kind of living.

Sorry for your loss, Ursula

Right, I need a massive kick up the arse re eating, exercise and spending this month.

This week has been a massive frugal fail. I've spent over £200 on two different sets of train tickets and £20 on unnecessary food at work.

Slight frugal win with discovering the passport to leisure scheme at the local leisure centre. £5 for 6 months and it gives you 25% off all activities and monthly memberships.

I have a ticket going 'spare' for a rugby match as I'm not well enough to go. DSS has offered it to a friend but haven't heard back yet - really want to get on with sticking it on FB for a quick sale.

Oh well at least we won't have to pay my train fare etc. Quite looking forward to a day totally to myself actually although I'm disappointed. Thankfully they were very cheap tickets.

DCs are at childminders so I am going to watch Eat Well For Less and yell at the laptop most likely

It does always shock me when they give the yearly equivalent saving though. Sometimes I think of it like that and it really brings it home - eg DD and I often share those prepared pots of pomegranate and/or fresh coconut, and I do think those two things are worth buying ready-to-eat compared to say ready chopped melon/mango (as the latter are easier to judge for ripeness etc) - but if I bought both every week, that's £104 a year!

fuzz aw, sorry to hear you aren't well.enough for the match!

I had to stop watching eat well for less too. I think people who spend like that must know how to cop themselves on, and are just playing dumb for the cameras. It's not actually a very helpful show. The last one I watched, that pissed me off the most, greg Wallace teaching a woman how to chop a carrot, so she could stop buying pre-prepped bags.
I would love if they did a show about how to make cheap meals, like a non poncetastic version of that Jamie Oliver one. Although I do like his new superfoods one, meals look cheaper on that than his budget cooking one!

Nsd here. Payday is Wednesday and it feels like forever away. Been baking this morning to try and stop me having to buy much to keep us going. Did some gluten free cookies and banana bread for snacks, not sure what else I can throw together! Have enough in for main meals, it's the lunches and bits that are gone!

We need to team up and make a frugaleers TV show. I bet they all use our thread as research anyway.

attention chilly frugaleers

www.bmstores.co.uk/products/new-york-10-5-tog-duvet-double-301617

Double duvet here for £1 at B&M! 10.5 tog. Use them as blankets on the sofa, under the bed sheet, on top of your normal duvet...... Curtains? It just says "contact nearest store for availability" but worth a shot.

I'm going to be super-frugal this week as I have a stomach bug and am reduced to eating only potatoes and water. Should I be pleased about that? Not sure really. I think I would rather spend the money on a pork chop.

Has anybody else tried moneydance as an alternative to ynab? It seems to do investments as well. I still do wonder if I should just stick with excel to avoid getting bitten by software errors.

Oh hurrah they are actually saying a USEFUL tip on the show (replacing half the meat in the shepherds pie with lentils)

I do that with pasta sauces but the lentils have a warning on them saying 'may contain gluten' so I can only use it for meals that DH won't be eating. Otherwise I'd probably tip a bit into everything.

Good grief. I just downloaded MoneyDance and then uploaded to it my latest online bank statement. It thinks I have £-46k, when I have a positive balance in the actual account. That was exactly the kind of thing that used to happen when I used Microsoft Money too. I think I will stick with Excel. I find it a lot easier to keep the numbers right when I design the system myself within a basic spreadsheet.

Sending stomach mending vibes to you ipsos

I just did the most unfrugal thing ever. Went to Gaps website. Entered the price draw. Won a 40% off voucher and bought a jumper.

I have put a very swanky dress on eBay that I adore but only wore once a few years ago (to a ball) that'll pay for my brand new jumper. It better last longer than 2 Winters.

£5 on wellies in a quick before school dash to Asda as DS's trip has no shelter and it's been raining hard forever.

£3.60 bus

£58 on tesco food for the week, lowest I got it for ages, and it included some socks and chocs for my nan.

Will spend £6 later on a bottle of wine as its Friday and I've had the type of day where a million little annoying things make you want to scream and punch the wall.

Get well soon ipsos and fuzz
collie I used to like shopping at Gap at Outlet village in Swindon collie especially tops, jeans and sweatshirts used to last lot longer then the ones I have bought from Asda, B&H or Matalan

Thanks fuzz and Love

Know what you mean about the unfrugality collie. It's easy to be caught by these things. My favourite in pre-ds years was the People's Friend Magazine "only pay postage" offers. They do things like a rose bush for £1.27. I used to send away for them every week as my little tiny treat. I had some very random things.

My ds has a lovely jumper from Gap that still looks brand new after about 8 years, so you might do very well out of that one.

Does anybody else shy away from sharing good news in case they jinx it? I keep wanting to say about the good things that have happened, and then keeping my mouth shut in case my talking about it causes Murphy's Law to step in and screw it all up.

I like Gap clothes. They still use lots of natural fibres.

Just made a lovely veg curry from various past their best vegetable which I would normally have thrown in the bin. I'm making progress I think....

NSD for me today. DS and I were heading to a McMillan coffee morning in the church but we got the date wrong so just played in the childrens corner for a while and wandered home via the allotments ( where we were given some tomatoes and carrots).

I'm off for a night away with friends on Saturday. My oldest friends and we get together about once a year so will be worth every penny ( and a found a voucher for the hotel restaurant!)

Happy weekend to all. :)

aw share ipsos, I love to hear a bit of good news! Everything seems so doom and gloom at the moment :(

Well my adventures to lidl went well. Had never done a full shop there. I actually ended up spending more than the sainsburys shop would have been had I placed it (it was £62 + £4 delivery), spent £74... but - the quality is fab, I have enough dinner stuff for a fortnight (the sains shop only had about 3 dinners in!), loads of packed lunch stuff, loads of treaty stuff (there was nothing treaty whatsoever in the sains shop) and 2 bottles of wine. Lots of lovely fresh fruit too. Really pleased. Shouldnt need to do a big shop at all next week, just a lunches / fresh stuff top up shop. Was a bit overwhelmed by the choice in the fresh section (all that ham!) so found it hard to work out which items were the best value, trial and error will tell I think. I think I could get to around £50 a week with lidl and that included packed lunches (DH was mostly buying his lunch up until this week), which would be fab and free up a good bit of the food budget to save.

Lidl version of wotsits and kids yoghurts passed the toddler taste test at lunch there no probs!

Thanks blue. I will share tomorrow I think. Safer that way.

I lost my post this morning about my hair.
Basically I just got a tbar done this time instead of half head of meche highlights and it only cost €30 so I had €35 left from cash from last week instead of nothing.